Introduction

Students taking this class for graduate credit should expect to do everything the undergraduates do plus some. Since graduate students are assumed to have some basic content and academic skills under their belt already, I will ask you to cover a little more ground this semester both in terms of learning material and analyzing it critically. This business of critical analysis marks the most important distinction between graduate and undergraduate education. In this course, that means that you should learn how historians agree and disagree in their analyses of 20^th Century U.S. popular culture and be able to assess their various interpretations through a critical analysis of their arguments, sources, and methods. You should also be able to interpret primary sources in light of their historical context, authors, audience, and form as well as content. I hope to teach the undergraduates the beginnings of these skills; you should be refining them.

To that end, you will have slightly more rigorous requirements for this class and my expectations for the work you share with the undergraduates will be higher. More specifically, you will base your research paper on a broader or deeper set of primary sources, analyze them more self-consciously, and include a section in your paper that sets your argument in its historiographical context. That means your précis should be longer to include a secondary source essay (I will explain this) and your research paper should wind up being about five pages longer than noted in the undergraduate syllabus. In order to develop a more critical discussion of course readings and accomplish the above goals, we will meet periodically as a separate group to discuss readings and assignments (see schedule of assignments). Also note: rather than read selected excerpts from Filene, Romancing the Folk, you will be expected to read the whole thing and so might want to own a copy.